IAC B-team of BJP faction: Congress

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Last Updated: Thu, Oct 18, 2012 03:19 hrs

New Delhi: Soon after Arvind Kejriwal led India Against Corruption (IAC) "exposed" the benefits of land and water derived by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Nitin Gadkari from the ruling Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in Maharashtra, Congress, which is a coalition partner of NCP, Wednesday said the expose was nothing by a move by IAC as the B-team of a faction of BJP which is opposed to Gadkari.

Congress spokesperson Manish Tiwari said the allegations were but reflection of internal warfare of BJP.

He said it is clear to which faction of BJP, the team of Kejriwal is affiliated with.

He said the "gentleman [Kejriwal] has validated our charge" that they are a B team of BJP.

Congress leader Rashid Alvi said it now the responsibility of BJP to react to the allegations since they had all along celebrated any allegation that was brought against Congress by the IAC.

IAC leader Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday fired his first major salvo at the opposition BJP by "exposing" a nexus between its president Nitin Gadkari and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) ruling the coalition government in Maharashtra in grabbing land of farmers and diverting irrigation water to the power plants and sugar mills owned by him in the Vidarbha region, where countless farm debt stricken farmers committed suicide.

Kejriwal in a packed press conference citing the example of one village said: "Gadkari got the water and land meant for the farmers from NCP leaders like Ajit Pawar [who resigned as the deputy chief minister of Maharashtra over the Rs 70,000 crore irrigation scam in the state]. This is not the story of one village, this is the story of entire Maharashtra."

"He [Gadkari] has a setting with the ruling party [NCP] and they tell each other- let both of us earn," said Kejriwal. He said it is a collusion of political interests that cheat the people of India.